Salinan enjoys helping finance people's dream homes

Saturday

Feb 3, 2018 at 12:00 PM

NAME: Madison Miles

AGE: 26

TITLE: Loan originator for The Mortgage Company, 155 N. Seventh

YEARS ON THE JOB: Two years

Madison Miles grew up in Salina, graduated from Salina Central High School and received a bachelor’s degree in business administration with a major in finance from Kansas State University. She worked as a financial planner for Morgan Stanley and UBS in Fort Worth, Texas, before job opportunities in Salina brought her and her fiancé, Louie, back home.

What made you want to return to Salina?

Louie is an engineer for Pfizer, so it just worked out that we could both move home and continue our careers. There was a great job opportunity for both of us, and we just couldn’t turn it down. We love Salina. We both grew up here. We love to go golfing, and we like to eat out at the different local restaurants. I think the best thing about being in Salina is being around family — my mom and step-dad, Jody and Karl Ryan; Louie's parent's, Lou and Vickie Marcozzi; my sister and brother-in-law, Morgan and Zach Powell, and especially my nephew, Hank. While living out of state, I would have the opportunity to visit home about twice a year. Being around family is important to us and we wanted to be able to spend more time together than that. Growing up in Salina has provided Louie and I with opportunities that we may have not had if we grew up in a larger city.

What’s a typical day like for you?

I meet with clients and discuss all of their options as far as the loan process goes. The first step in the home-buying process is to get pre-approved. I gather all of their information and determine whether they are pre-approved for a loan and what is the best loan type or program for them. Next, they find a home and write an offer on it. Once an offer has been accepted, the loan will go through underwriting and then we close. I work with my clients through the whole process of putting the loan in place. We are not a bank. We are a broker, so we work with several different investors. That is how we can really stand apart from others because we have so many options extended to us because we work with all different types of banks and investors.

Our office is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, but we are not limited to those hours. It is not uncommon to meet with clients on evenings or weekends. We have an open-door policy. Our cellphone numbers are on our business cards, so we get phone calls and texts at all hours from our clients. When someone needs to get hold of us, typically, it’s pretty urgent. I don’t want to be the reason somebody misses out on the home of their dreams that just came on the market this weekend.

Do you have any pointers for people who are hoping to buy a home?

The best thing I can recommend is if somebody’s even considering buying a house, they should come on in and we can talk about it. You don’t want to wait until you find the perfect house to start the pre-approval process and then find out you have an issue with your credit that you didn’t know you had. The pre-approval process allows me to determine a price range for the client. Then they can relay that on to the realtor and say, ‘Yes, I am approved. Here’s my approval letter, and I’m approved for this price range.' That way they really know what to be looking at.

There are really two big factors when getting qualified for a loan — your credit score and your debt-to-income ratio. Many times, they go hand in hand. I would recommend if you really want to buy a home in the near future, make all of your payments on time and avoid opening new debt. Examples of new debt would be to open up a new credit card, buy a vehicle, or even in-store financing. All of those items have an impact on your credit score, and typically, it is negative.

Do you ever have to help people who have been the victim of identity theft?

We have. We can pull their full credit report and go through each item with them. By doing that, we can figure out if this was you. Did you open this credit card? It’s really a pretty clear picture of all the credit items for that particular person. Dealing with identity theft is always difficult so we want to be as helpful as possible. A lot of times we can’t do the leg work for them because with identity theft, creditors want to make sure the client is the one calling on their own behalf, and not a third party. We can guide them on who to call, what to do, and determine a plan for next steps on how to get this off their credit and get their credit rebounding from it. We’ve even had clients who had collections in the past and have paid them all off, but it’s still showing up that they have a balance. In cases like this, we help them determine who to contact to work toward getting items removed.

Your credit report gives you a lot more information other than just your credit trades. If you go all the way through the report, it will show you other aliases that it is pulling in under your credentials with your address, name and Social Security number. This may include your maiden name or married name and sometimes it will pull up names that you do not recognize. That’s a good thing to point out to your lender. It’s always good to double-check and make sure the information that’s feeding through on your report is actually your information.

What do you find the most rewarding about this job?

Considering that I work with my clients from start to finish, I would definitely say the most rewarding moment is closing. My clients are choosing to buy a home, and we are the ones making it happen. There is a whole team of us throughout the process — their realtor, title company, insurance agent, appraiser, etc. For me, as the lender, it is rewarding getting to watch my clients sign the last page of their closing documents and have the realtor hand them their keys. This shows that all of their hard work has paid off and they can now own the home of their dreams.

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.